


Healing

by anawitch



Category: RWBY
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Season/Series 03 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 21:58:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5944662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anawitch/pseuds/anawitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knew there was nothing she could do to make this okay. It didn’t mean she wasn’t going to try.</p>
<p>--<br/>Major spoilers for chapter 11!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Healing

Ruby was nine when she broke her arm. All she wanted was a glass of milk, but she had always been short for her age, and she needed to climb up onto the counter to open the wall cabinet. It was something she’d done a thousand times before, and perhaps that was why when she grabbed onto the handle it broke loose and sent her hurtling into the kitchen tiles.

It hurt so much she passed out, and the last thing she had heard was Zwei barking urgently and the sounds of footsteps coming down the stairs. When she came to Yang was on her knees in the shattered glass breathing hard, eyes wet, scraping the debris off of her desperately. There was nobody else at home, and Ruby had sobbed hysterically – she had never felt something so painful before in all her life, and she was sure she never would again. She couldn’t move her arm. She had never been so terrified.

But Yang was with her, and she called an ambulance, and she made her match her slow breaths to keep her calm until the paramedics arrived and took her to the hospital. Once her arm had been put in a cast and a sling, Yang promised to help her decorate it, and Ruby forgot all about the pain and rambled on and on about all the things she wanted to draw on the plaster when they got home. She kept her word, and Ruby had the coolest cast that had ever existed for months and months while her arm healed.

That’s what Ruby thought about first when she found her after the battle of Beacon.

“Ruby,” Sun caught her arm as soon as she arrived, his expression uncharacteristically sombre and pained. The crowd were gathered around an inert figure that Ruby couldn’t quite make out through the throng of miserable students. She peered at him, confused, but he couldn’t seem to put what was on his mind into words.

Somebody must have heard Sun mention her name, and they stepped aside so that she could see. Her older sister lay with her back towards her, stationary, hair messy and spayed out all around her, like somebody had gently moved it off of her face. She glowed gold with aura, and Ruby’s heart dropped to her stomach.

“Yang!” she cried out, and the crowd parted. Sun didn’t try to stop her: she sprinted the short distance between them and fell to her knees at her side, and then she saw the damage.

“Oh, no.” Her eyes stung with tears, though she could hardly believe what she was seeing. Yang was so powerful, so unstoppable, yet there she lay, unconscious and pale and delicate and helpless. It couldn’t be real.

“I’m sorry,” a soft voice said from beside her, one that she couldn’t identify in her grief, but that was shaky and weak. “I couldn’t stop him…”

“Yang…” Ruby said again, letting the tears fall as she pressed her forehead to her shoulder – the one above her only remaining arm. 

\--

Yang seemed so quiet and distant when she woke up. That she couldn’t even fake a smile made Ruby feel a constant ache of sadness even while she helped Ironwood work on the replacement, because she knew there was nothing she could do to make this okay. It didn’t mean she wasn’t going to try.

So when she saw her older sister’s lip twitch in what might have been amusement while Ironwood secured the prosthetic to her skin, she held her breath. Yang extended the arm and twisted it, facing the palm to the ceiling, then to the floor again. Finally she made a fist and breathed out a quiet laugh.

“This… is awesome, Rubes,” she said.

“You haven’t even seen all of it yet! Look, if you open up this part here you can load up your shells… and this bit at the back you can put dust in – Weiss suggested it – and you can lock your gauntlet onto it if you want, but you don’t need to – it works fine without. You’ll be able to lift the same, maybe even more, and it should be comfortable enough to-“

Yang threw her arms around her back and lifted her up off her feet, squeezing her in a crushing hug for the first time in weeks. Her new arm was a little cold and hard, but Ruby hugged her back just as tightly anyway, beaming.

“You’re the best.”

\--


End file.
